China’s Tianjin Sainty Natural Gas to shut LNG plant on 2 May

27 April 2012 10:12[Source: ICIS news]

SINGAPORE (ICIS)--?xml:namespace>China’s Tianjin Sainty Natural Gas is planning to shut its 100,000 cubic metre (cbm)/day liquefied natural gas (LNG) plant in Tianjin on 2 May for a 10-day turnaround, a company source said on Friday.

The shutdown was planned in response to weak demand, the source said, adding that contract supply would not be significantly affected.

“We are building up inventories and are trying to meet 85% occupancy rate of our warehouse before the shutdown in order to secure consistent [LNG] supply to our contract customers during that period,” the source added.

According to market sources, some China-based LNG producers are also planning for turnarounds or maintenance at their units during the second quarter of this year on the back of weak demand from downstream sectors.

Tianjin Sainty Natural Gas is mainly engaged in the production and sales of LNG, and is capable of producing around 33m cbm/year of LNG.

The company uses feedstock gas supplied from PetroChina’s Dagang oil field in Tianjing and its output is mainly distributed within northeast and north China.